Settlers

The number of settlers in the West Bank has probably been overestimated. Both Israeli and Palestinian smoothies will be motivated to exaggerate the settler population. Many settler houses to the east of the Separation Wall are either empty, or occupied just at weekends or during Jewish festivals. Since the evacuation of Gaza, when displaced settlers were generously compensated, it would not be surprising if some Israelis had bought a subsidised settlement house as a holiday home and as a shrewd investment. Most settlers would leave peacefully when the time came, according to the Oxford Research Group and to Uri Avnery of the Israeli peace movement, Gush Shalom.

Most of the settlers live on the Israeli side of the Separation Wall in areas likely to be retained in any future land exchange.So the settler extremists' dream - to bring thousands of Israelis deep into the West Bank to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state - is clearly failing.
In the past when settlements have been evacuated, occupants have been carried away one-by-one in full view of television cameras. This make-believe is unnecessary. The Israeli government should simply announce the date on which their troops are to be withdrawn from a certain area.
Settlers who decided to stay would enjoy Palestinian, or perhaps joint Israeli-Palestinian, citizenship. They would be subject to Palestinian law, with precisely the same rights and duties, mutatis mutandis, as the non-Jewish citizens who now comprise one-fifth of the population of Israel. These rights would include the right to vote in Palestinian elections, equal access to social and health services, and exemption from military conscription. The peace settlement would formalise this reciprocal arrangement, safeguarding minorities in both nations.
Some hard-line settlers may stay and resist. If so the Palestinian authorities could simply cut off their electricity and water supply for a token period to demonstrate that isolated settlements were no longer viable. No violence would be needed.

• Consider - the 2013 report of the Human Rights Council on the effects of Israeli settlements on the rights of the Palestinian people.
• New York Times survey on settlement expansion
• a boundary agreement
• the reuse of settlement buildings
• the labelling of settlement goods
• other initiatives that Quakers might advocate